Lockdown day 52 - Hares and regulations

Apparently, we have a family of hares living on the marina. I've only seen one, an adult, probably the male. They live under the office building which is built on a platform on sloping ground, so there's lots of space for them. I don't think I've seen more than ten all my life, so it was a pleasant surprise for me when I saw this one. Unusually, I didn't have my camera with me.

(photos from unsplash.com)

The new lockdown regulations as they apply to us as boaters are pretty much no different from previous ones in our opinion. The Canal & River Trust have recently sent this out...

From today, Weds 13 May 2020
Private boaters may undertake short boating trips – avoiding use of locks and any staff-operated structures if possible – providing, as per current government guidance, they do not stay away from home overnight and return to their home mooring (where they have one).
From Saturday, 23 May:
Mooring exemptions will come to an end and our guidance for continuous cruisers comes back in to force. This doesn’t mean that every boat without a home mooring needs to move on this day, just that we expect it to move off its current mooring within 14 days (i.e. by 6 June). Boaters in a high-risk group who need to continue to shield or self-isolate can agree special arrangements with their licence support officer if they haven’t already done so.
From Monday, 1 June:
On this date, we anticipate that our navigations will re-open in full, subject to some local exceptions, making longer journeys possible.

Life goes on as new normal for us. We'd love to be cruising, of course we would, but everyone's safety from infection is important, so we'll be happy to stay here for as long as it takes. We could do a short trip out and back for a day, but I reckon this stretch of the Grand Union - the summit of the Leicester Arm, just 20 miles long - will be packed silly by those who have less patience than us.

There is much ongoing bickering amongst boaters on social media; those who think CRT's interpretation of the government regulations is wrong, and who bloody well ARE going to start cruising now, and those who see the sense in waiting until the infection and daily mortality rates fall. Personally, I don't think we'll hit the 1st June target. So be it.

Now here's a strange thing. I took a photo the other day, through the saloon window; the beginning of a fabulous sunset. In fact, I took two - click, move a bit, click. Then I downloaded them onto my laptop, and this is what I found.

Remarkable, isn't it? A work of art, except it wasn't intentional. It was some odd glitch in the camera, I suppose. The second photo was how I expected them both to be; an okay photo of... well you can see for yourself.

I've posted the arty one in a number of Facebook groups, and the response has been overwhelming. Perhaps I could sell it, and it would adorn the living-room walls of art-lovers everywhere!

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Our week with Michelle - return journey

Thursday's travel started with Blisworth Tunnel. This time we encountered just one boat coming in the opposite direction, and two going our way.

We stopped at Gayton Junction services, then moved on to a vacant spot on the long-term moorings for lunch.

The journey to Nether Heyford, where we stopped for a quick bit of shopping, and on to our mooring just beyond, continued hot and sunny, through beautiful countryside.

Normally camera-shy, Michelle allowed me to take one photo of her.

On Friday morning, we moved on to Buckby where, after the bottom lock, we paired up with NB Windsong for the rest of the flight. Pip and Roger were very good company, and we moved along at a good pace with them, with lots of chat on the way. At the top lock, Pip told Michelle that the lock-keeper's cottage there is featured in the book "Lock, Stock and Barrel", a title which Michelle recalled seeing on our bookshelves. It's a signed copy, given to us by brother-in-law Rod - I'll have to read it soon.

Windsong and Kantara left the top lock and made off towards Norton Junction, turning right there onto the Leicester Arm of the Grand Union. Pip and Roger took the last remaining mooring straight after the turn, and kindly invited us to breast up to Windsong, which we did. We all needed lunch! 

Within the hour, the boat next to Windsong moved off, and we hauled Kantara back into that space, where we stayed for the night. When Roger told us that there was a good satellite TV signal at that location, we tried our FreeSat (which we had finally got working back in the marina). Nothing! Roger came along and helped us, but all to no avail, and we concluded that the tuner in the TV has an intermittent fault. We have a standalone tuner in the house, and there might be one still in the marina lounge (subsequently, I found that it had been taken by someone else), so it's not too much of a problem.

Saturday morning, Windsong left before we got up, but I saw them leaving Watford Top Lock as we arrived later, and I went up to sign in with the lockie. Unlike our descent the week before, our ascent was speedy. The lockie took it upon himself to do the locks for us, thus depriving an enthusiastic Michelle of her last locking session of the trip. We had lunch above the top lock, then left for Yelvertoft, arriving there in the sunny and hot weather we had been fortunate to have throughout the whole week. 57 miles and 42 locks.

Michelle treated us to a meal at The George that evening - excellent as usual - and left for home the next morning, feeling relaxed and refreshed. Thank you, Michelle, for sharing the week with us; for your company, the laughs and the fun - and your help on the locks!

She sent me the following photos the next day; her favourites of the many she took during the week.

A trip out for painting

There are stretches of rural mooring just north of Bridges 23 and 27 on the Grand Union which are absolutely ideal for boat painting. In both cases, the metal mooring pilings are very low, close to the water, and allow easy access to the whole of the hull above the blackened area. Ironically, we stopped off at Bridge 23 at the start of our Leicester Ring cruise back in June, and finished the painting on the port side which we had started last autumn. We had intended to find a suitable mooring on the cruise at which to complete the job started on the starboard, but didn't get around to it.

Ironically, after the cruise, the paintwork on the port side (and, no less, the starboard) needed further attention, so yesterday we drove the boat out to Bridge 23 again, intent on completing both sides in two or three days. The port side was relatively simple; just a matter of sanding the scratches and scrapes, then cleaning and painting them.

We adopted a new policy which is going to affect us a lot as long as we have the boat. It is normal practice to apply a primer and an undercoat wherever the paint has been removed to expose bare metal. However, since this is going to need to be done after every cruise we do, and since the topcoat paint is the only one which is actually waterproof, we will in future do as we did yesterday; that is, to apply topcoat only. Any rust which may appear under the paint will show up on the surface long before there is anything worse than surface corrosion, and it will be a quick and simple matter to deal with it again. "Little but often" is the motto.

So, the port side was finished in the afternoon, and it looked good.

Job done!

Part of our plan for the days out was to check just how reliable our batteries are now. We had concerns about them while we were hooked up to the landline in the marina, inasmuch as the battery charger just kept charging, hour after hour, refusing to let the battery voltage drop even a couple of volts. This is unusual behaviour, and sounded alarm bells to me.

As we settled down to our evening meal, the batteries measured 13.2 volts, with little or no load. They were still the same at around 8:00pm when I turned on the inverter, and we both started to use our laptop computers. The voltage dropped very quickly to 12.1v. Not good! Continuing to use the inverter was out of the question. This in itself consumes around 5 amps, added to the 14 used by our laptops. We would expect to start an evening of computer use with the batteries reading around 12.8v, which would drop to 12.4 in a couple of hours.

We spent the evening with one small light on, watching a DVD on Grace's computer, off its own battery power. When that battery went flat about ten minutes from the end of the film, we used the battery-driven TV and DVD player to watch to the end, but the batteries were very low by then, and we went to bed using as few lights as we possibly could.

It rained hard overnight. The paint was unharmed, but the weather looked very unsettled (despite the weather forecast, which promised clear sunshine), and it rained again briefly a couple of times before we got on the move again. The plan had always been to move from Bridge 23 to the winding just beyond 28, then back to moor at the low bank below Bridge 27 in order to paint the starboard side. Please note that the whole journey from the marina to the winding and back is just seven miles - around two hours travel.

We passed the first painting spot, considering the weather to be too windy and uncertain to risk doing any painting. Arriving at the second spot, the sun was out, but the clouds still threatened. So we continued back to the marina, arriving back in time for lunch. We'll have a go next week.

I texted Colin, and booked a day for him to replace our three dead batteries with four new ones. We know the several reasons why this first set - new when we bought the boat - have not lasted as long as they should. We are wiser now, and the new batteries will be maintenance-free, meaning that we will never run the risk of their electrolyte getting too low, as happened a few weeks ago. The new ones will last much longer.

An unusual craft, pushing a butty.

A very small tug